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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Live performers without peer,
By
This review is from: Hoarse (Audio CD)
Anyone who has seen 16 Horsepower live knows how intense and riveting their performance can be. In fact, it was not until I saw them live the first time that I became a dedicated fan. Now I can't get enough of this truly unique quartet.Until now, I had not heard much live material from 16hp to do them justice. Then came "Hoarse." This is, without a doubt, one of the best live recordings I have ever heard. At times it is easy to forget you are listening to a live recording--the quality is THAT high (cf. "Horse Head," "Bad Moon Risin'" and others). Not only does the recording capture the stirring chemistry between the band and one enthusiastic audience, but it also showcases one quality of the bad that sets them apart from so many others--their ability to grow and change without losing their roots. Along side favorites like "American Wheeze," "For Heaven's Sake" and "Brimstone Rock" (performances that truly capture the intensity David Eugene Edwards and co. deliver during show after show), these boys have retooled other classics and have made them new. After a rollicking bluegrass opening, they launch into a "countrified" version of "Black Lung"--simply brilliant! But the absolute show-stopper here is "Hoarse Head." What was once an edgy rocker has become a mournful dirge, complete with soulful cello and wailing vocals. I experienced the song as if for the first time. The lyric feel and mental landscape which it creates came into stark focus. Words and phrases jumped out at me I had never "heard" before in its previous incarnation. The song has become one of my favorites, which I could not say before. The ability for a band to grow and allow their songs to evolve this way is remarkable. Not only are their hands gifted with musical verve and grace, but their minds are still active and engaged. Rest assured, 16hp is alive and growing. "Hoarse" also offers three covers, two of which are real gems. "Bad Moon Risin'" is a staple for their live sets. 16hp pay CCR's classic homage, but do so under a blue moon. You'll never hear the song the same again. Another pleasant surprise is their cover of Joy Division's "Day of the Lords"--which also offers us a glimpse behind the divergent musical forces that have shaped this band. The song suits the darkness of 16hp's usual haunts, as does the intensity of their delivery. It would be interesting to see more of this kind of visitation. On the other hand, I can't say that I like "Fire Spirit"--a Gun Club cover. I just don't think it fits 16hp either in style or content. It seems out of place here. Their own brand of rock suits me just fine--this particular song goes nowhere fast. This small exception aside, "Hoarse" is brilliantly conceived and executed. Here's to more and better live recordings like this in the future! If you have never seen Sixteen Horsepower live, do yourself a huge favor next time they are in your area. Until then "Hoarse" offers you a front row seat (you might as well be on stage!) for what is by far one of the best live bands performing today. It is truly a splendid and captivating performance, now ours for all time.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
The next best thing to "being there",
By
This review is from: Hoarse (Audio CD)
16 Horsepower may very well be the best live show around today. Onstage, they deliver an intensity that has nothing to do with pyrotechnics or flash of any kind and everything to do with the band's (especially singer/songwriter David Eugene Edwards') vision. The music is at once visceral and diaphanous, smacking you in the gut, then retreating like fog when you turn your head. The ghosts of Appalachia are here, as is the spirit of Leadbelly and any Chatauqua tent preacher. Demons (worldly and otherwise) babble and shriek and tempt, the voice of God is hard to hear and harder to follow, but always just in front and just behind you as you listen. And these polar extremes are always contained within all of us - that is the genius of the message brought home by seeing 16HP live. It's not a unique idea that all people consist of good and evil impulses, but watching Edwards bent over the microphone and banjo or accordion, you FEEL it in the same way that looking at film footage of an earthquake is different from watching the plaster crack in your apartment while you listen to that unbelievable low tearing noise that no truck or train or man-made sound could match."Hoarse" is the next best thing to seeing the band live. Though 16 Horsepower have no "hits" in the money-driven, radio sense of the word, this disc is loaded with much of their best material: Brimstone Rock, Black Soul Choir, Low Estate, American Wheeze and others are given full-throttle treatment. I've also always maintained that you can tell a great deal about a band by whom they choose to cover, and how well they make the songs they cover their own. On "Hoarse", 16 Horsepower prove no less formidable in this respect: versions of songs by Joy Division, The Gun Club, and Creedence Clearwater Revival are indications of the band's diverse influences. And what versions they are! "Bad Moon Rising" is transformed from a major-key uptempo folk-rocker in the hands of Fogerty into a creepy, minor key backwoods warning. Lines like "hope you are quite prepared to die" and "one eye is taken for an eye" have a menacing, this-is-just-around-the-corner feel that sounds like it should have always been there in the song. Frankly, if you look just at the words of the tune, it's easy to imagine 16 Horsepower's terrifying rendition being the music that should have accompanied them in the first place. The best bands have always presented a unique view of the world which draws you in and leaves you no other way to relate to the world for the duration of the music. Afterwards, some of that vision becomes part of your own, and you are changed forever. Sixteen Horsepower are the sound of the crossroads, and this disc is a perfect introduction.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
For the Dirty Whiskey Folk,
By Greg (Indiana, USA) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Hoarse (Audio CD)
Admit it, you love it when you get an album that is so good that everyone you have listen to it gives awkward dirty looks. You know the looks, the ones that say, "What are you making me listen to and why do you own it!?"
Hoarse is an amazing live set. The band displays an eerie energy as if playing from a busted-up warped wood porch in some unsettling fog... and the front yard a 19th century cemetery. This is back-woods folk / country / wrath of heaven & hell whiskey guzzlin' music. You'll be left staring at the technology playing this recording in awe wishing you had an old turntable and 'Hoarse' on primitive, mono vinyl. Modern stereos seem to be this music's antithesis. Let me add too that often it is difficult to make out the lyrics. Don't let that adversely affect you. You will be affected though, whether you like the affect as I did or not is another story. This is not your typical live disc. Hoarse feels like it should be heard and played this way. An experience to say the least.
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